S.H.I.E.L.D

H.I.E.L.D. was created by Nicholas Joseph Fury after the end of World War II, but Fury abandoned the idea and left the draft that he created for the agency locked away, feeling the U.S. government wouldn't approve the formation of such an agency. At some unspecified point around this time, however, a United Nations-based international group dusted off the idea without Fury's knowledge. His recruitment to the post of executive director (the agency's second) marked his first knowledge of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s existence.

A rare quiet moment for Nick Fury: Strange Tales #168 (May 1968). Art by Jim Steranko and Joe Sinnott.

Usually led by Nick Fury as executive director (although he reports to a twelve-member council, whose identities even he does not know), this organization often operates as much as a covert agency as a quasi-military one, initially depicted as affiliated with the United States government. Later, S.H.I.E.L.D. was depicted as under the jurisdiction of the United Nations, with vast technological resources at its disposal, with U.N. General Assembly Resolutions and legislation passed in signatory nations aiding many of their operations.^[2][3] (However, S.H.I.E.L.D. has been inconsistently portrayed as under U.S., rather than U.N., control, possibly by writers unaware of the agency's fictional history. For instance, in Astonishing X-Men #3, Nick Fury explains S.H.I.E.L.D.'s inaction during an incident of genocide by stating that it did not occur on American soil.^[4])

During the time that Godzilla roamed the United States, S.H.I.E.L.D. formed a subunit, the "Godzilla Squad" to hunt the creature down, until it disappeared into the Atlantic sea. This unit, led by Dum Dum Dugan, employed such weapons as a giant robot called Red Ronin and a smaller version of the Helicarrier, known as The Behemoth.

One of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s unique technological innovations, the LMD (Life Model Decoy) — an extremely lifelike android used to replace people in imminent danger of being killed — was the basis for two major upheavals. First, the supervillain Scorpio stole that technology and used it to create the second team of villains called the Zodiac. Later, some LMDs known as the Deltites achieved sentience and infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D., replacing key members, until Fury defeated them. This led to the disbanding of the original organization and its replacement by a new taskforce with the same acronym.

In the wake of a disastrous unauthorized mission in Latveria, in the multi-title story arc "Nick Fury's Secret War", Fury effectively resigned as executive director, with international warrants out for his arrest. His first successor was not one of his closer associates but a relatively unknown newcomer to the S.H.I.E.L.D. hierarchy, Maria Hill. A transcript of a conversation between Hill and the President of the United States^[5] revealed she was chosen for the post by United Nations consensus to keep Fury loyalists out of the job and to keep relations with the superhero community to a minimum. The President also expected Hill — an American — to be loyal first to U.S., despite S.H.I.E.L.D. being a U.N.-chartered organization.

Agents Valentina Allegra de la Fontaine and Dum Dum Dugan, Strange Tales #168 (May 1968). Art by Steranko and Sinnott.

The passage of the United States' Superhuman Registration Act and the subsequent superhero "Civil War" created an additional political and ethical irritant between S.H.I.E.L.D. and the superhuman community, with ^[6] S.H.I.E.L.D. tasked to lead enforcement and to take on registered superheroes as operatives.

Toward the end of that conflict, Hill concluded she had been made director with the intent that she fail at the job, and she proposes to Tony Stark that he assume the post himself, with her as deputy. Stark accepts the appointment as director upon the conclusion of the superhuman Civil War, and undertakes a series of initiatives, including the construction of a new gold-and-red Helicarrier in the motif of his Iron Man designs, the introduction of a daycare center in the Helicarrier, and an employee suggestion-box. While accused of treating S.H.I.E.L.D. as a Stark Industries subsidiary, he succeeded in streamlining the organization and raising morale.^[7] S.H.I.E.L.D. fought a wave of global superhuman terrorism and was manipulated into two international incidents that almost saw Director Stark arrested, until they revealed the Mandarin to be behind it and stopped him from committing genocide with an Extremis pathogen.

At the start of the Secret Invasion by the extraterrestrial shape-shifting race the Skrulls, the Helicarrier was disabled by a Skrull virus and left floating and disabled in the Bermuda Triangle.^[8] The Skrulls by this point had already replaced a large number of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, including the high-ranking Timothy "Dum-Dum" Dugan.

Organizational structure and procedure

Over the decades, varying writers have depicted S.H.I.E.L.D.'s organizational structure in several different ways. The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe (first edition) describes an eight-level ranking structure, although providing almost no detail on other aspects of the Directorate's internal makeup.

Most of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s agents are normal humans. Years ago the organization attempted to set up a team of superhuman agents, composed of Marvel Man (the future Quasar), Texas Twister, Blue Streak and the Vamp but the last two were secretly agents of the criminal organization called The Corporation, and the team broke apart before it had its first official mission. A second team organized years later also lasted only a short while.

S.H.I.E.L.D. does employ some superhumans, including in its Psi-Division, composed of telepathic agents who deal with like menaces. S.H.I.E.L.D. also obtains help from independent heroes when their special abilities are needed. It has also accepted some superheroes and supervillains as members, but no longer in a separate unit. (See "Membership".)

Its headquarters is the Helicarrier, a massive flying aircraft carrier kept airborne at all times and, among other things, containing a squadron of jet fighters and housing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). In addition, S.H.I.E.L.D. maintains strong ties to the superhero community, especially Captain America, the Avengers, and the Fantastic Four, and often calls upon that community for aid on particular missions.

In the 2000s, depictions of S.H.I.E.L.D. imply a hierarchy of security clearance levels used either in place of, or alongside, the previously described rank structure. The security-clearance hierarchy operates on a scale ranging from "Level One", the lowest, to "Level Ten", described by Maria Hill, executive director at the time, as the highest security clearance anyone of any government can have. Hill's own clearance, cited in the series New Avengers was Level Nine.

The first story arc in the series New Avengers (2005- ), "Breakout", revealed an additional ranking, "Champion Status", that effectively removes them from the traditional S.H.I.E.L.D. hierarchy and, as Captain America comments, gives status-holder such as himself the right to assemble any team to carry out any mission he believes necessary. In addition Nick Fury is the only "33rd-degree" S.H.I.E.L.D officer, meaning he is the only member of S.H.I.E.L.D, present or past, to know the full existence of 28 emergency, covert, back-up bases scattered across the globe.